Saturday, November 22, 2014

Looking at the face of comics

The biggest record
store in my town has a fairly impressive rack of comic book trades
and hardbacks, devoting half a dozen bookcases to the art of the
four-colour funnies, and offering up a wide variety of comics for
surprisingly reasonable prices.

I sometimes wonder what
it all looks like to a non-comic reader. If you didn't know anything
about them, what would it look like to you? What would stand out, and
what would grab the attention?

I've been deep in the
world for comics since before I can read, so I'm always looking for
specifics on the shelf – who published this, and who drew that. My
interests in comics has become ridiculously refined over the years,
and I always know exactly what I'm looking for.

But if all you had to
go on was a collection of books, beaming their covers out into the
world, what would look good?

It's all pretty
subjective, but some publishers really do a better job of presenting
their face to the world than others. Unfortunately, despite decades
and decades of experience with creating great comic covers, DC is not
currently one of them.

The bookshelf full of
DC comics really can't be that appetising, with cluttered covers that
are far too over-coloured and over-designed, and a sheer weight of
dull product.

The glut of the New 52
has spread through into the collected editions, with dozens and
dozens of awfully average comics racking up multiple editions. There
is no cohesive look amongst the individual titles, and they're all
yelling at you, drowning each other out in white noise. Even Batman –
the most iconic of all superheroes, and the hardest to screw up –
often has too much going on.

There is the odd
nicely-designed collection from DC, especially when they start
morphing into the Vertigo books, but they're drowning in this sea of
ill-thought posing, dull melodrama and over-use of text. It's
particularly painful because DC used to be all about the brilliantly
catchy cover, with the company's bronze age highlights always found
on its fantastically designed covers.

Superman and Batman and
Green Arrow and the Flash might be some of the biggest characters DC
has, and the movies and TV shows they spawn must surely have some
people looking to the original source, but there is nothing pretty to
see here.

There is more of that
unearned enthusiasm on Marvel's face, but also signs of hope. There
is that same churning mass, with some of the unexpectedly popular
Deadpool books offering little in the way of innovation or real
style.

But there is also a
pleasantly large amount of good design work, with some terrific use
of white space and sparse, iconic artwork. The Moon Knight and
Hawkeye books use this approach to look absolutely lovely, and the
more a Marvel cover breaks everything down, the more eye-catching it
becomes.

Even the Avengers and
X-books, which invented most modern notions of superhero clutter,
have some slick looking books on the stands, looking unexpectedly
stylish and enticing.

Next to the Marvel
monolith are the smaller publishers, and this is where I think the
real treasures are found, but again, I know what I am looking for.
This is a total mash-up of all kinds of comics, and it can get
disturbingly random – Adventure Time books are sandwiched between
Prison Pit and Tank Girl, which is going to get somebody in trouble
some day, but that randomness is part of the charm. It's always
interesting to see what weird pile of independent comics you're going
to get in a non-specialist comic store, you could end up with
anything.

But that also means
that section belongs to readers who are just not interested in
superhero nonsense – My Little Pony for the enthusiastic kids,
Darwyn Cooke's Parker for the more thoughtful grown-ups. And it's
also a bright and colourful section, with fantastic covers on books
by Charles Burns, Dan Clowes and Art Spieglemen aching for some
browsing.

And somewhere in the
vast gulf between Persepolis and Harley Quinn, there is the Image
comics, and it has to be the most enticing section of all.

It's a section anchored
down by The Walking Dead – hands-down the most successful gateway
comic in the past decade – and offers more of stand-alone thrills
of a single story.

I've had a mental
catalogue devoted to the deep minutiae of the Marvel and DC universes
since I was four, but I know that's abnormal, and most people don't
give a shit about what ties into what, they just want to read a
straight story. And Image has somehow become the company that serves
up that kind of smart, stylish story, with something for everybody.

After all, I don't give
a damn about Saga or East Of West, but they both have enthusiast
fans, so they must be doing something right. And these are the shelves
where I buy the latest Prophet book, or the odd Brubaker thing I
miss.

There is some sparkling
variety in there, at an excellent price – you can get most of the
first trade paperbacks for the price of two new X-Men issues from the
comic shop up the road.

It's not a huge
selection, and the variety only goes so far, but look at all those
lovely covers, bringing that shelf to life. There is excellent design
work going into the presentation of these Image publications –
sharp colours, simple layouts, eye-catching logos.

I still can't quite get
into the mindset of somebody with no interest in comics, so I could
still be completely wrong – maybe those monstrous New 52 covers
really do grab the interest of somebody who watches The Flash TV
show.

But I can't deny that I
just think the Image stand looks so much better than the bigger
publishers' sections, and so much more welcoming to the new reader.
We all judge a book by its cover (even if we all hate to admit it),
and Image has some fucking awesome covers.